R.I.P R.C. (New Poem from Janice Stephens)

I am a novice poet who has a lot to learn. Having discovered in later life the real joy in poetry, I enjoy all types, particularly contemporary work.  I have attended several one day and longer courses on writing poetry and am currently attending a course at Citilit in London.  I self-published my first collection of 50 poems 'Fifty First Timers' last year with KDP.'

R.I.P. R.C.

Corpus Christi.

A sultry June day.

Bees buzz midst dandelions on the lawn

beneath the convent chapel.

Long before they learn how to swear

the five year olds,

hands clasped,

in hand-me-down white dresses,

fall onto their knees

on the gravel steps to pray.

Black robes swish up and down

the rows of white statues, keeping order:

“Don’t fidget”.

Then Benediction.

“Examine your consciences children”

And like troops for Jesus they march

to get a blessing.

Bedtime in the dormitory offers solace

as long as they hold their tongues and avoid the strap.

Adults now, they no longer go to church.

By Janice Stephens

Fur flies in Fez (eyewitness account of a cat fight)

Description of a cat fight in the Medina in Fez.  

Underneath the tablecloth the two cats inched forwards, pulled back their ears till neither a cuff nor punch nor hiss was left in them only a violent spasmodic side attack as if they were two skewed rhinoceroses about to battle for their calves' lives. They soon flew till intertwined, twisting, fur flying in clumps while Arabic teenage lovers watched in fascination and subdued alarm; underneath a cup of hajjira my wife, tilting to the side and raising her menu, was a picture of fear while the pair of combatants scratching at each other, face gripping to a point of puncture, twisted in the dust in their violent embrace and  - looking for purchase at horrendous cost to themselves - went at each other for round two with kangaroo style scraping and punching till they were co-joined like one giant camel pillow or white ginger fur ball, a fleeting sinewy leather purse with no head  - as it was now clear they were deeply biting each other; in the melee, this shapeless leather orb was topped by two separate sets of testicles and a clear red anus pulled in every direction. The waiter came with a menu or other and walloped the padded shape of cat/cats very hard, thudding at them like he was trying to remove a mushroom growth from a tree with a shovel, till like an oblong soccer ball the frenzied orb was pummelled into the back kitchen where it screeched and bawled and growled like a demonic entity that had manifested itself into fiery being. I never saw them again and do not know the final ending of those two cats because the noise stopped suddenly and I hope one ran away. At around this time another cat fight ensued above in a tree and two male cats, one like a black cougar and the other, a beige puma, chased each other up the overarching branches growling at each other with an inner deeply disturbing engine sound not possible to mimic which belied their size as adolescent cats. They faced off and stress clutched the tree completely oblivious to any danger of a fall or chance to fall into the busy lane below. The image in the dusk was akin to seeing the image of a cat against a skyline on the eve of Halloween crawling along as if stalking. Both cats remained oblivious of all other motion or affairs of trade below, singularly focused on each other, in limbo tails flicking neither willing to move till dusk when they may have come down or retreated and skulked onto the tops of the soup kitchen and restaurant.